media to the Web. We began testing in
November with the full launch slated for

1Q 2015.”Tapper says the relationship with R2Chas been “invaluable.” He adds, “We’re sofortunate to have David Savage and Mar-ilyn Davis directing strategy. We neededcreative, media billings and digital strate-gies, and they did it in five months.”The company also brought on beautyindustry veteran Marina Randolph in late2014 as chief revenue officer. “We arebuilding an entire DR team beneath her,”Tapper says. The idea is to take photo-therapy and democratize it to the masses— and Marina brings a great understand-ing of both the market and the regulatoryTapper also knows that the, shall wesay, different look of the product gives itboth intriguing advantages and odd chal-lenges to overcome. “The early reviewsdidn’t really focus extensively on whatthe product is and if it works,” he sayswith a laugh. “We kept hearing all thesereferences to Daft Punk or ‘Star Wars.’The two-minute videos we tested on Fa-cebook were effective and we began usingclever tags to play off those reviews. But,in the end, we need to educate consumerson what the product actually does — andDR is the greatest format for that.”When asked about the goals forilluMask’s DR campaign — whichconsists of 30-second, 60-second and120-second spots — Tapper talks like adirect response veteran. “The goal is a lowcost-per-order (CPO),” he says. “We willconsistently A/B test and refine to keepdriving that CPO down. We have a con-tinuity model in place and retail distribu-tion already moving. That omnipresencein retail helps keep the media costs downearly in the campaign. The media mayeven become self-funding if initial resultshold. But we’re flexible. We’re going toput our money behind whatever performsbest — whether it’s TV, prestige retail,Walmart or online.”While the La Lumiere team is toutingonly its acne benefits to start, illuMaskalso has anti-aging uses, and Tapper saysthey will tackle those. “When most com-panies run a DR campaign, they have justone product message,” he says. “Whilewe’re able to run it on acne, we believewe will see a huge halo effect in anti-aging.”All of this work eventually drew thenotice of Johnson & Johnson’s invest-ment division, though Matheson saysthat traditional CPG marketers in thebeauty space have generally avoideddevices. “Once J&J really saw the reac-tion in the market, the buzz in the beautybusiness media and the uniqueness of theproduct, I believe that’s what promptedthem to jump on,” Matheson says aboutthe company’s eight-figure investment inNovember.

“As soon as we realized we wanted to
do DR, we knew we needed a lot more
money,” Tapper says. “We hired a banker
and went through a second-round funding process. There was a lot of interest
from a lot of folks, including two or three
equity firms with experience in beauty.
We approached J&J through Neal, and it
made sense to do the deal with them. We
preemptively structured the deal so that
they are minority partners. My job is to
make the investors money. I always make
my partners money. DR is so accountable
that it makes it easy to do that.” ;

Professionally, I was really fortunate
that when I was 22, my parents took
me to China as a college graduation
present. We toured factories and
looked at products. I fell in love
with developing and inventing
products. Without that education, I probably wouldn’t
have had career I’ve had.”

Greatest Career Accomplishment: “It has to be the illuMask.
Making it effective, beautiful and
affordable took 20 years of product
development knowledge and experience. And we did it in record time.
You have to put your product ;rst.
And you have to have a passion for
it, and passion has carried illuMask
from day one.”